The Micro Artist Studio

The Micro Artist Studio is the pride of Seiko Epson. This studio is home to a small team of craftsmen, each specialized in different aspects of luxury watchmaking. The Studio designs every movement and case, polishes each key component and then assembles every watch by hand. Watchmaker Katsumi Nakata, who has been a part of the team since the beginning of the development of Calibre 9R01, says about the assembly of the movement, “You might think that it would be challenging to put every beautifully polished part in its place but it isn’t as difficult as you might imagine since ease of assembly is considered from the initial stages of the design.” His words about the difficulty of work should perhaps be taken with a grain of salt since Nakata is, after all, a Contemporary Master Craftsman and recipient of a Japanese medal of honor, the Medal with Yellow Ribbon, but his comment certainly bears witness to the advantages of having a tightly knit team of experts together in one place, all sharing responsibility for the perfection of one another’s work.

Katsumi Nakata, working on the movement’s assembly. The tools he uses are his own, designed for his own hands. He adapts and polishes them himself.

A series of three barrels, arranged in linear sequence for maximum energy efficiency

Each of the three barrels houses a separate mainspring and they are arranged in a linear sequence with no intermediate wheel to reduce the energy loss. The hand polishing of key components reduces friction and thus also increases the efficiency of the movement. In addition to its exceptional 8-day power reserve, this watch also offers a remarkable level of precision, +/- 0.5 second per day.

Moteki’s original drawing of the linked series of three barrels.

Chapter 4The 8-Day Power Reserve: Extraordinary performance delivered by the harmonization of many watchmaking skills.